Week 1 & 2 World Regions Geography Notes PDF

# Week 1 ## Week 1 Lec 2 (world regions) - 3 types of geography: - physical (the place, the climate, etc) - human/cultural (the people, why people are there, etc) - geographic techniques (methods used to make maps and quantify information) - Every flat map is wrong - Mercator Projecti...

# Week 1 ## Week 1 Lec 2 (world regions) - 3 types of geography: - physical (the place, the climate, etc) - human/cultural (the people, why people are there, etc) - geographic techniques (methods used to make maps and quantify information) - Every flat map is wrong - Mercator Projection: for sailors navigation - Peters: wildly distorts at poles - Winkel Tripel: most used today, fewer distortions - Large scale: greater detail of smaller area (more zoomed in) - Small scale: less detail of a larger area (zoomed out) ## Week 1 Lec 3 (realms) - Criteria for a realm: - Physical and human: based on physical and human criteria (i.e. South Asia and South America) - Functional: interaction of human society and their environment (villages, cities) - Historical: interaction over time (helps define the clusters of people in the world, i.e. China and India) - Maps and realms are constantly evolving and changing and will keep doing so ### Two types of realms - **Monocentric:** has a single major political power (i.e. US, China) - **Polycentric:** functionality and organization of realm is dispersed among several more or less influential regions or countries (i.e. Europe, Pacific realm) - Regions are smaller areas within realms, defined by all types of things ## Week 1 Lec 4 (other factors) - **Climate:** (long period weather) regions, which is currently changing a lot - **Population clusters** (humans only occupy 30% of earth's surface, but that population is clustered around specific areas) - Europe accounts for 4 of the 8 billion people on earth (one of the most industrialized areas on earth) - Why can't you live in a lot of places? Climate reasons like cold weather and deserts, - **Urbanization:** - proportion of total population living in cities and towns (55% today) - **Urban Growth Rate:** - growth of urban population over time - **Megacities:** - huge urban agglomerations with populations over 10 million (33 in 2018, 39 in 2021, guessing 47 in 2030) - Megacities in the U.S. are LA, New York, Chicago - 29 new megacities predicted to be in Asia and mainly China - **Cultural Realms:** (language is the very essence of culture), people are very protective around their mother tongue, there is an english only movement going on in the U.S. - Around 25 languages are lost every year, with around 6,900 languages remaining in the world (half of which are considered endangered) - Globalization results in cultures blending and other ones fading away - **Religion** shaped the world and regions are often dominated by single religions. # Week 2 ## Week 2 Lec 1 Sub-Saharan Africa - There is a correlation between population density and water supply - Fertile Crescent, where agriculture first occurred, the Cradle of Civilization, also developed in areas like Central America with maize, and in Asia with rice and pigs - Levant is top of the peninsula - Fertile Crescent Crops: figs, olives, grapes, almonds, pistachios, millet, flax, barley, wheat, sesame - Two types of agriculture: - **Dry agriculture:** where cereal crops relied on rainfall, mainly practiced in hill countries w more rainfall like Lavant and Upper Mesopotamia - **Irrigation agriculture:** centered in alluvial plains of lower Mesopotamia, irrigation to water crops - Agriculture allowed people to stay in one place, which is HUGE ## Definitions - **State (country):** a clearly and legally defined territory inhabited by a citizenry governed from a capital city by a representative government - **Realm boundary** can cut across states i.e. in Indonesia, they are usually what separates realms too like North and Middle America with the US-Mexico border. - **Sovereignty:** Controlling power and influence over a territory, especially by the government of an autonomous state over the people it rules (i.e. government reigns supreme is the final word within its borders) - **Geopolitics:** Political relations among states or regions that are strongly influenced by their geographical setting, including proximity, accessibility, sovereign boundaries, natural resources, population distribution, and the like. - The integrity of many states have been challenged by terrorist groups, some of the most contested areas are found in the Middle East (i.e. Taliban, Al-Qaeda, ISIS) - The root of every regional conflict...ever: **Real Estate** (land), **Resources**, **Religion** - **Development** is used to gauge a country's economic, social, and institutional growth and overall well-being (import and exports, other data) reported to the UN - Development is very uneven across different regions, even among regions - **Globalization:** process where spatial relations, economic, cultural, political shift to the macro scale, aka what happens in one place can affect another place i.e. supply chain problems (global village) - Globalization sped up with things like better technology (so u can hear about opportunities easier), easier transportation to move - Wealthy countries pull migrants to them, but not all migrants can entry their country of choice (i.e. poverty or oppression - More developed countries are increasingly not want immigration, specifically illegal immigration (people think they are a threat to culture, their own stability - Populist politicians have taken on anti immigration positions to gain support (specifically concerning less educated or poor, or religious or ethnically different migrants or refugees) - Many of these countries face demographic problems with low birth rates and aging population (they might even need immigrants to stabilize their populations)